28th Dec. 10

You gaze at me with your ten thousand eyes,
you do so and it is I,
I do not stir,
my feet are completely embedded in the ground,
I allow myself to be reached by your ten thousand glances
or if you prefer
by the single glances of your ten thousand eyes
but it is not the same,
such an immense gaze touches me everywhere,
I hesitate to move,
if I raise my arms toward the sun
you slant your eyes to adjust to the light,
they sparkle but you look at me or else if I should move into the shade
I am cold
your eyes are not visible
there where you follow me
I too am unseen by you,
I am dumb in this desert devoid of your tenthousand eyes
darker than the dark
where you reyes would appear to me
ten thousand fold black and shining,
I am alone until the moment when I hear a variety of sounds of bells of tintinnabulation.
I tremble.
I am giddy, it reverberates within me,
it makes me quiver,
it is the music of the eyes I say to myself,
either they clash together gently and with violence
or they produce these many sounds by themselves,
I fling myself flat on my face
in front or behind this side or that,
I gesticulate wildly to that I cannot escape
the multiplicity of your regard,
wherever I may be
my ineffable one
you gaze at me with your ten thousand eyes.




Monique Wittig.